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Once more, if you fear the fickleness of friendship, consider that
in any other case a quarrel might be a mutual calamity; but now,
when you have given up what is most precious to you, you will be the
greater loser, and therefore, you will have more reason in being
afraid of the lover, for his vexations are many, and he is always
fancying that every one is leagued against him. Wherefore also he
debars his beloved from society; he will not have you intimate with
the wealthy, lest they should exceed him in wealth, or with men of
education, lest they should be his superiors in understanding; and
he is equally afraid of anybody's influence who has any other
advantage over himself. If he can persuade you to break with them, you
are left without friend in the world; or if, out of a regard to your
own interest, you have more sense than to comply with his desire,
you will have to quarrel with him. But those who are non-lovers, and
whose success in love is the reward of their merit, will not be
jealous of the companions of their beloved, and will rather hate those
who refuse to be his associates, thinking that their favourite is
slighted by the latter and benefited by the former; for more love than
hatred may be expected to come to him out of his friendship with
others. Many lovers too have loved the person of a youth before they
knew his character or his belongings; so that when their passion has
passed away, there is no knowing whether they will continue to be
his friends; whereas, in the case of non-lovers who were always
friends, the friendship is not lessened by the favours granted; but
the recollection of these remains with them, and is an earnest of good
things to come.